Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Young people in St. Elizabeth are being urged to get into beekeeping, to satisfy the huge local and international demand for honey and other bee by-products.

"Jamaica has potential; very, very big potential in beekeeping, because honey is in short supply both locally and internationally," said First Deputy Chairman of the Jamaica Federation of Commercial Apiculturists (JFCA), Elton Cawley.

He was addressing an Agri-business Expo held on Thursday (Feb. 19) at the Santa Cruz Community Centre in St. Elizabeth.

According to Mr. Cawley, because of the shortage in supply of honey locally, the price for the product in Jamaica was higher than what it was being sold for overseas.

He said that in addition to producing liquid honey, persons could also go into the production of bee derivatives such as propolis, royal jelly, pollen and wax, which fetch good prices both locally and abroad…